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B.C. school support staff reach tentative deal with province

B.C. school support workers have reached a tentative deal with the provincial government, heading off potential strike action.

Photograph by: Stuart Davis
, Vancouver Sun

Looming job action by 33,000 unionized school support staff in British Columbia has been averted with a tentative two-year contract.

The BC Public School Employers' Association and CUPE BC, which represents 27,000 of the workers, say a 3.5 per cent wage increase has been negotiated over the life of the deal.

It includes a one per cent boost retroactive to July 1, a 2.0 per cent increase on Feb. 1, 2014 and a final hike of half a per cent next May.

Schools in some parts of the province were bracing for a strike that could have occurred as early as Monday amid fears that teachers would refuse to cross picket lines.

The agreement was signed just before midnight Wednesday.

Education Minister Peter Fassbender said Thursday that the negotiations were not easy.

"There is still a lot of work ahead,'' he said in a statement.

"School districts will need to develop savings plans to pay for the agreement and 69 different union locals will seek approval from their members before final ratifications. We expect the ratification process will move more quickly in some districts than in others.''

Both sides must still ratify the tentative pact, with voting dates to be announced.

The union's kindergarten to Grade 12 Presidents' Council agreed on Thursday afternoon to recommend the agreement.

The public school employees, including education assistants, clerical staff, trades workers and bus drivers have been without a contract for more than a year.

Members in 57 of the bargaining units belong to CUPE, and the International Union of Operating Engineers, Local 963, represents the 12 other locals, which include people who work in trades.

Bill Pegler, CUPE's kindergarten- to Grade 12 co-ordinator, said the union fought to have concessions removed from the bargaining table since it began bargaining last November.

It also asked for a wage hike of four per cent in line with the pattern established by other public-sector settlements in the post-secondary sector, Pegler said.

"What we ended up with was slightly less, and that's what our presidents are studying today.''

The contract for the deal, which expires in June 2014, must be ratified by the end of December.

The union will start negotiating again in the spring, Pegler said.

Negotiations between the teachers' union and the government's bargaining agent have been on hold pending a court case.

The B.C. Teachers Federation has taken the government to court seeking damages over its decision to strip the teachers' contract in 2002, a move the Supreme Court of Canada ruled was unconstitutional.

Bargaining is expected to resume in October.

New Westminster board of education chair Michael Ewen, who is also a teacher in the Surrey school district, said he felt "relief" when he heard that an agreement was reached.

"I was really concerned just from the way things sounded like they were that they were looking at job action next week, and that we would have the schools shut down for indeterminate amount of time. I'm relieved that we are not going to be doing that," Ewen said.

Paul Simpson, president of CUPE local 379, which represents Burnaby school support workers, said the union was asking for a four per cent wage increase, while the government was putting forth deal-breaking concessions that would have resulted in less money overall. Simpson said there will be no strike, but the agreement still has to be ratified by all union locals.

"I think it appeases most of the members' concerns," he said. "The concessions were all the taken off the table, the original wage was reduced, so there's only a 3.5 per cent (increase) rather than four."

Greg Frank, secretary-treasurer for the Burnaby school district, said a 3.5 per cent increase would cost the district $1.5 million.

"It will be a challenge for the board to identify the saving that will be required because the savings must be sustainable," Frank said.

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